 CHAPTER 50 This luller here will pricel in a somewhat name by my father's soul, that shall he not. Said the strip man, here shall he not preach. We shall know gospel, close and here may teach. We live and all in the great God. Quote he, he world and sworn, some difficulty, canterbury tales. Dorothea had been safe at Freshett Hall nearly a week before she had asked any dangerous questions. Every morning now she sat with Celia in the prettiest of upstairs-sitting rooms, opening into a small conservatory. Celia all invited Lavender like a bunch of mixed violets, watching the remarkable acts of the baby, which were so dubious to her an experienced mind that all conversation was interrupted by appeals for their interpretation made to the oracular nurse. Dorothea sat by in her widow's dress with an expression which rather provoked Celia as being much too sad for not only was baby quite well, but really when a husband had been so dull and troublesome while he lived and besides that had well, well. Sir James of course had told Celia everything with a strong representation how important it was that Dorothea should not know it sooner than was inevitable. But Mr. Brooke had been right in predicting that Dorothea would not long remain passive where action had been assigned to her. She knew the purpose of her husband's will made at the time of their marriage and her mind as soon as she was clearly conscious of her position was silently occupied with what she ought to do as the owner of Loick Manor with the patronage of the living attached to it. One morning when her uncle paid his usual visit though with an unusual alacrity in his manner which he accounted for by saying that it was now pretty certain parliament would be dissolved forthwith Dorothea said uncle it is right now that I should consider who is to have the living at Loick after Mr. Tucker had been provided for I never heard my husband say that he had any clergyman in his mind as a successor to himself I think I ought to have the keys now and go to Loick to examine all my husband's papers there may be something that would throw light on his wishes no hurry my dear said Mr. Brooke quietly mine by you know you can go if you like but I cast my eyes over things in the desk and drawers there was nothing nothing but deep subjects you know besides the will everything can be done by and by as to the living I have had an application for the interest already I should say rather good Mr. Tike had been strongly recommended to me I had something to do with getting him an appointment before an apostolic man I believe the sort of thing that would suit you my dear I should like to have fuller knowledge about him uncle and judge for myself if Mr. Cosobon has not left any expression of his wishes he has perhaps made some addition to his will there may be some instructions for me said Dorothea who had all the while had this conjecture in her mind with relation to her husband's work nothing about the rectory my dear nothing said Mr. Brooke rising to go away and putting out his hand to his nieces not about his researches you know nothing in the will Dorothea's lip quivered come you must not think of these things yet my dear by and by you know I'm quite well now uncle I wish to exert myself well well we shall see but I must run away now I have no end of work now it's a crisis a political crisis you know and here is Celia and her little man you are an aunt you know now and I am a sort of grandfather said Mr. Brooke with a placid hurry anxious to get away and tell Chatham that it would not be his Mr. Brooke's fault if Dorothea insisted on looking into everything Dorothea sank back in her chair when her uncle had left the room and cast her eyes down meditatively on her crossed hands look Dodo look at him did you ever see anything like that said Celia in her comfortable staccato what kitty said Dorothea lifting her eyes rather absently what why is upper lip see how he is drawing it down as if he meant to make a face isn't it wonderful he may have his little thoughts I wish nurse were here do look at him a large tear which had been for some time gathering rolled down Dorothea's cheek as she looked up and tried to smile don't be sad Dodo kiss baby what are you brooding over so I'm sure you did everything and a great deal too much you should be happy now I wonder if Sir James would drive me to Lovic I want to look over everything to see if there were any words written for me you were not to go till Mr. Lidgate says you may go and he has not said so yet here you are nurse take baby and walk up and down the gallery besides you have got a wrong notion in your head as usual Dodo I can see that it vexes me where am I wrong kitty said Dorothea quite meekly she was almost ready now to think Celia wiser than herself and was really wondering with some fear what her wrong notion was Celia felt her advantage and was determined to use it none of them knew Dodo as well as she did or knew how to manage her since Celia's baby was born she had had a new sense of her mental solidarity and calm wisdom it seemed clear that where there was a baby things were right enough and that error in general was a mere lack of that central poising force I can see what you're thinking of as well as can be Dodo said Celia you're wanting to find out if there's anything uncomfortable for you to do now only because Mr. Cosobon missed it as if you had not been uncomfortable enough before and he doesn't deserve it and you will find that out he has behaved very badly James is as angry with him as can be and I had better tell you to prepare you Celia said Dorothea entreatingly you distress me tell me at once what you mean it glanced through her mind that Mr. Cosobon had left the property away from her which would not be so very distressing why he has made a cortisol to his will to say the property was all to go away from you if you married I mean that is of no consequence said Dorothea breaking in impetuously but if you married Mr. Ladislaw not anybody else Celia went on with preserving quietude of course that is of no consequence in one way you never would marry Mr. Ladislaw but that only makes it worse of Mr. Cosobon the blood rushed to Dorothea's face and neck painfully but Celia was administering what she thought a sobering dose of fat it was taking up notions that had done Dodo's health so much harm so she went on in her neutral tone as if she had been remarking on baby's robes James says so he says it is abominable and not like a gentleman and there never was a better judge than James it is as if Mr. Cosobon wanted to make people believe that you would wish to marry Mr. Ladislaw which is ridiculous only James says it was to hinder Mr. Ladislaw from wanting to marry you for your money just as if he ever would think of making you an offer Mrs. Cad Valader said you might as well marry an Italian with white mice but I must just go and look at baby Celia added without the least change of tone throwing a light shawl over her and tripping away Dorothea by this time had turned cold again and now through herself back helplessly in her chair she might have compared her experience at that moment to the vague alarmed consciousness that her life was taking on a new form that she was undergoing a metamorphosis in which memory would not adjust itself to the stirring of new organs everything was changing its aspect her husband's conduct her own duties feeling towards him every struggle between them and yet more her whole relation to will ladislaw her world was in a state of convulsive change the only thing she could say distinctly to herself was that she must wait and think anew one change terrified her as if it had been a sin it was a violent shock of repulsion from her departed husband who had had hidden thoughts perhaps perverting everything she said and did then again she was conscious of another change which also made her tremulous it was a sudden strange yearning of heart towards will ladislaw it had never before entered her mind that he could under any circumstances be her lover conceive the effect of the sudden revelation that another had thought of him in that light that perhaps he himself had been conscious of such a possibility and this with the hurrying crowding vision of unfitting conditions and questions not soon to be solved it seemed a long while she did not know how long before she heard Celia saying that will do nurse he will be quiet on my lap now you can go to lunch and let Garrett stay in the next room what I think Dodo Cecilia went on observing nothing more than that Dorothea was leaning back in her chair and likely to be passive is that Mr. Cosmon was spiteful I never did like him and James never did I think the corners of his mouth were dreadfully spiteful and now he has behaved in this way I'm sure religion does not require you to make yourself uncomfortable about him if he has been taken away that is a mercy and you ought to be grateful we should not grieve should be baby said Celia confidentially to that unconscious center and poise of the world who had the most remarkable fists all complete even to the nails and here enough really when you took his gap off to make you didn't know what in short he was Buddha in a western form at this crisis litgate was announced and one of the first things he said was I fear you are not so well as you were Mrs. Cosmon have you been agitated allow me to feel your pulse Dorothea's hand was of a marble coldness she wants to go to lawic to look over papers said Celia she ought not odd she litgate did not speak for a few moments then he said looking at Dorothea I hardly know in my opinion Mrs. Cosmon should do what would give her the most repose of mind that repose will not always come from being forbidden to act thank you said Dorothea exerting herself I'm sure that is wise there are so many things which I ought to attend to why should I sit here idle then with an effort to recall subjects not connected with her agitation she added abruptly you know everyone in middle March I think Mr. litgate I shall ask you to tell me a great deal I have serious things to do now I have a living to give away you know Mr. Tyke and all that but Dorothea's effort was too much for her she broke off and burst into sobs litgate made her drink a dose of salval attire let Mrs. Cosmon do as she likes he said to Sir James whom he asked to see before quitting the house she wants perfect freedom I think more than any other prescription his attendance under Dorothea while her brain was excited had enabled him to form some true conclusions concerning the trials of her life he felt sure that she had been suffering from this strain and conflict of self repression and that she was likely now to feel herself only in another sort of pinfold than that from which she had been released let gates advice was all the easier for Sir James to follow when he found that Celia had already told Dorothea the unpleasant fact about the will there was no help for it now no reason for any further delay in the execution of necessary business and the next day Sir James complied at once with a request that he would drive her to Loic I have no wish to stay there at present said Dorothea I could hardly bear it I'm much happier at fresh it with Celia I shall be able to think better about what should be done at Loic by looking at it from a distance and I should like to be at the grunge a little while with my uncle and go about in all the old walks among the people in the village not yet I think your uncle is having political company and you are better out of the way of such doings said Sir James who at the moment thought of the grunge chiefly as a haunt of young ladders laws but no word passed between him and Dorothea about the objectionable part of the will indeed both of them felt that the mention of it between them would be impossible Sir James was shy even with men about disagreeable subjects and the one thing that Dorothea would have chosen to say if she had spoken on the matter at all was forbidden to her at present because it seemed to be a further exposure of her husband's injustice yet she did wish that Sir James could know what had passed between her and her husband about will ladders laws moral claim on the property it would then she thought be apparent to him as it was to her that her husband's strange indelicate proviso had been chiefly urged by his bitter resistance to that idea of claim and not merely by personal feelings more difficult to talk about also it must be admitted Dorothea wished that this could be known for will's sake since her friends seem to think of him as simply an object of Mr. Cossabon's charity why should he be compared with an Italian carrying white mice that word quoted from Mrs. Cadwallader seemed like a mocking travesty wrought in the dark by an impish finger at Lowick Dorothea searched desk and drawer searched all her husband's places of deposit for private writing but found no paper addressed especially to her except that synoptical tabulation which was probably only the beginning of many intended directions for her guidance in carrying out this big quest of labor to Dorothea as in all else Mr. Cossabon had been slow and hesitating oppressed in the plan of transmitting his work as he had been in executing it by the sense of moving heavily in a dim and clogging medium distressed of Dorothea's competence to arrange what he had prepared was subdued only by distrust of any other redactor but he had come at last to create a trust for himself out of Dorothea's nature she could do what she resolved to do and he willingly imagined her toiling under the fetters of a promise to erect a tomb with his name upon it not that Mr. Cossabon called the future volumes a tomb he called them the key to all mythologies but the months gained on him and left his plan related he had only had time to ask for that promise by which he sought to keep his cold grasp on Dorothea's life the grasp had slipped away bound by a pledge given from the depths of a pity she would have been capable of undertaking a toil which her judgment whispered was vain for all uses except that consecration of faithfulness which is a supreme use but now her judgment instead of being controlled by duties devotion was made active by the embittering discovery that in her past union there had lurked the hidden alienation of secrecy and suspicion the living suffering man was no longer before her to awaken her pity there remained only the retrospect of painful subjection to a husband whose thoughts had been lower than she had believed whose exorbitant claims for himself had been blinded his scrupulous care for his own character and made him defeat his own pride by shocking men of ordinary honor as for the property which was the sign of that broken tie she would have been glad to be free from it and have nothing more than her original fortune which had been settled on her if there had not been duties attached to ownership which she ought not to flinch from about this property many troublesome questions insisted on rising had she not been right in thinking that the half of it ought to go to Will Ladisla but was it not impossible now for her to do that act of justice Mr. Cossabon had taken a cruelly effective means of hindering her even with indignation against him in her heart any act that seemed a triumphant eluding of his purpose revolted her after collecting papers of business which she whisked to examine she locked up again the desk and drawers all empty of personal words for her empty of any sign that in her husband's lonely brooding his heart had gone out to her in excuse or explanation and she went back to fresh it with a sense that around his last hard demand and his last injurious assertion of his power the silence was unbroken Dorothea tried now to turn her thoughts towards immediate duties and one of these was of a kind which others were determined to remind her of the gates ear had caught eagerly her mention of the living and as soon as he could he reopened the subject seeing here a possibility of making amends for the casting vote he had once given with an ill-satisfied conscience instead of telling you anything about Mr. Taik he said I should like to speak of another man Mr. Fairbrother the vicar of St. Puttals his living is a poor one and gives him a stinted provision for himself and his family his mother aunt and sister all live with him and depend upon him I believe he has never married because of them I never heard such good preaching as his such plain easy eloquence he would have done to preach at St. Paul's cross after old Latimer his talk is just as good about all subjects original simple clear I think him a remarkable fellow he ought to have done more than he has done why has he not done more said Dorothea interested now in all who had slipped below their own intention that's a hard question said Litgate I find myself that it's uncommonly difficult to make the right thing work there are so many strings pulling at once fair brother often hints that he has got into the wrong profession he wants a wider range than that of a poor clergyman and I suppose he has no interest to help him on he is very fond of natural history and various scientific matters and he is hampered in reconciling these tastes with his position he has no money to spare hardly enough to use and that has led him into card playing middle march is a great place for vest he does play for money and he wins a good deal of course that takes him into company a little beneath him and makes him slack about some things and yet with all that looking at him as a whole I think he is one of the most blameless men I ever knew he has neither venom nor doubleness in him and those often go with a more correct outside I wonder whether he suffers in his conscience because of that habit said Dorothea I wonder whether he wishes he could leave it off I have no doubt he would leave it off if he were transplanted into plenty he would be glad of the time for other things my uncle says that Mr. Dyke is spoken of as an apostolic man said Dorothea militatively she was wishing it were possible to restore the times of a primitive zeal and yet thinking of Mr. Fairbrother with a strong desire to rescue him from his chance gotten money I don't pretend to say that Fairbrother is apostolic said Litgate his position is not quite like that of the apostols he is only a person among parishioners whose lives he has to try and make better practically I find that what is called being apostolic now is an impatience of everything in which the person doesn't cut the principal figure I see something of that in Mr. Dyke at the hospital a good deal of his doctrine is a sort of pinching heart to make people uncomfortably aware of him besides an apostolic man at Loic he ought to think as St. Francis did that it is needful to preach to the birds true said Dorothea it is hard to imagine what sort of notions our farmers and laborers get from their teaching I have been looking into a volume of sermons by Mr. Dyke such sermons would be of no use at Loic I mean about imputed righteousness and the prophecies in the apocalypse I have always been thinking of the different ways in which Christianity is taught and whenever I find one way what makes it a wider blessing than any other I cling to that as the truest I mean that I mean that which takes in the most good of all kinds and brings in the most people as sharers in it it is surely better to pardon too much than to condemn too much but I should like to see Mr. Fairbrother and hear him preach do said Litgate I trust to the effect of that he is very much loved but he has his enemies too there are always people who can't forgive an able man for differing from them and that money-winning business is really a blot you don't of course see any middle-march people but Mr. Ladislaw who is constantly saying Mr. Brook is a great friend of Mr. Fairbrother's old ladies and would be glad to sing the vicar's praises one of the old ladies Ms. Noble the aunt is a wonderfully quaint picture of self-forgetful goodness and Ladislaw gallants her about sometimes I meet them one day in a back street you know Ladislaw's look a sort of daffence and coat and waistcoat and this little old maid reaching up to his arm they looked like a couple dropped out of a romantic comedy but the best evidence about Fairbrother is to see him and hear him happily Dorothea was in her private sitting room when this conversation occurred and there was no one present to make Litgate's innocent introduction of Ladislaw painful to her as was usual with him in matters of personal gossip Litgate had quite forgotten Rosa Monsrema that she thought will adored Mrs. Cosobon at that moment he was only caring for what would recommend the Fairbrother family and he had purposely given emphasis to the worst that could be said about the vicar in order to forestall objections in the weeks since Mr. Cosobon's death he had hardly seen Ladislaw and he had heard no rumour to warn him that Mr. Brooks confidential secretary was a dangerous subject with Mrs. Cosobon when he was gone his picture of Ladislaw lingered in her mind and disputed the ground with that question of the low with living what was will Ladislaw thinking about her would he hear of the fact which made her cheeks burn as they never used to do and how would he feel when he heard it but she could see as well as possible how he smiled down at the little old maid an Italian with white mice on the contrary he was a creature who entered into everyone's feelings and could take the pressure of their thought instead of urging his own with iron resistance end of chapter 50 recording by red abress February 2008 chapter 51 of middle March this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information not a volunteer please visit LibriVox.org middle March by George Eliot chapter 51 party as nature to unusual see by force of logic how they both agree the many and one the one in many all is not some nor some the same as any genus holds species both are great or small one genus highest one not high at all each species has its differential too this is not that and he was never you though this and that arise in you and he are like as one to one or three to three no gossip about Mr. Casabon's will had yet reached Ladislaw the air seemed to be filled with the dissolution of parliament in the coming election as the old wakes and fares were filled with the rival clatter of itinerant shows and more private noises were taken little notice of the famous dry election was at hand in which the depths of public feeling might be measured by the low flood mark of drink will that is slow was one of the busiest at this time and though Dorothy as widowhood was continually in his thought he was so far from wishing to be spoken to on the subject that when lidgate sought him out to tell him what had passed about the Loick living he answered rather waspishly why should you bring me into the matter I never see mrs. Casabon and I am not likely to see her since she is at fresh it I never go there it is Tory ground where I am the pioneer no more welcome the poacher and his gun the fact was that will had been made the more susceptible by observing that mr. Brook instead of wishing him as before to come to the Grange often of them was quite agreeable to himself seem now to contrive that he should go there as little as possible this was a shuffling concession of mr. Brooks to Sir James Chatham's indignant remonstrance and will awake to the slightest hint in this direction concluded that he was to be kept away from the Grange on Dorothea's account her friends then regarded him with some suspicion their fears were quite superfluous they were very much mistaken if they imagined that he would put himself forward as an idiot venture trying to win the favor of a rich woman until now will had never fully seen the chasm between himself and Dorothea until now that he was come to the brink of it and saw her on the other side he began not without some inward rage to think of going away from the neighborhood it would be impossible for him to show any further interest in Dorothea without subjecting himself to disagreeable imputations perhaps even in her mind which others might try to poison we have forever divided said will I might as well be at Rome she will be no further from me but what we call our despair is often only the painful eagerness of unfed hope there were plenty of reasons why he should not go public reasons why he should not quit his post at this crisis leaving mr. Brooke in the lurch when he needed coaching for the election and when there was so much canvassing direct and indirect to be carried on will could not like to leave his own chessman in the heat of a game and any candidate on the right side even if his brain and marrow had been as soft as was consistent with a gentlemanly bearing might help to turn a majority to coach mr. Brooke and keep him steadily to the idea that he must pledge himself to vote for the actual reform bill instead of insisting on his independence and power of pulling up in time was not an easy task mr. Fairbrothers prophecy of a fourth candidate in the bag had not yet been fulfilled neither the parliamentary candidate society nor any other power on the watch to secure a reforming majority seeing a worthy notice for interference while there was a second reforming candidate like mr. Brooke who might be returned at his own expense and the fight lay entirely between Pinkerton the old Tory member bags to the new wig member returned at the last election and Brooke the future independent member who was to feta himself for this occasion only mr. Hawley and his party would bend all their forces to the return of Pinkerton and mr. Brooke's success must depend either on plumpers which would leave bagster in the rear or on the new minting of Tory votes into reforming votes the latter means of course would be preferable this prospect of converting votes was a dangerous distraction to mr. Brooke his impression that waivers were likely to be allured by wavering statements and also the liability of his mind to stick afresh at opposing arguments as they turned up in his memory gave will ladislaw much trouble you know there are tactics in these things so mr. Brooke meeting people halfway tempering your ideas saying well now there's something in that and so on i agree with you that this is a peculiar occasion the country with a will of its own political unions that sort of thing but we sometimes cut with rather too sharp a knife ladislaw these 10 pound householders now why 10 draw the line somewhere yes but why just at 10 that's a difficult question now if you go into it of course it is said will impatiently but if you were to wait till we get a logical bill you must put yourself forward as a revolutionist and then middle march would not elect you i fancy as for trimming this is not a time for trimming mr. Brooke always ended by agreeing with ladislaw who still appeared to him a sort of Burke with 11 of Shelley but after an interval the wisdom of his own methods reasserted itself and he was again drawn into using them with much hopefulness at this stage of affairs he was in excellent spirits which even supported him under large advances of money for his powers of convincing and persuading had not yet been tested by anything more difficult than a chairman's speech introducing other orators or a dialogue with a middle march voter from which he came away with a sense that he was a tactician by nature and that it was a pity he had not gone earlier into this kind of thing he was a little conscious of defeat however with mr. Mormsey a chief representative in middle march of that great social power the retail trader and naturally one of the most doubtful voters in the borough willing for his own part to supply an equal quality of teas and sugars to reformer and anti-reformer as well as to agree impartially with both and feeling like the burgesses of old that this necessity of electing members was a great berth into a town for even if there were no danger in holding out hopes to all parties beforehand there would be the painful necessity at last of disappointing respectable people whose names warrant his books he was accustomed to receive large orders from mr. brook of tipton but then there were many of pinkerton's committee whose opinions had a great weight of grocery on their side mr. mormsey thinking that mr. brook is not too clever in his intellects was the more likely to forgive a grocer who gave a hostile vote under pressure had become confidential in his back parlor as to reform sir put it in a family light he said rattling small silver in his pocket and smiling affably will it support mrs. mormsey and enable her to bring up six children when i am no more i put the question fictitiously knowing what must be the answer very well sir i ask you what as a husband and a father i am to do when gentlemen come to me and say do as you like mormsey but if you vote against us i shall get my groceries elsewhere when i sugar my liquor i like to feel that i'm benefiting the country by maintaining tradesmen of the right color those very words have been spoken to me sir in the very chair where you are now sitting i don't mean by your honorable self mr. brook no no no that's narrow you know until my butler complains to me of your goods mr. mormsey said mr. brook soothingly until i hear that you send bad sugars spices that sort of thing i shall never order him to go elsewhere so i am your humble servant and greatly obliged said mr. mormsey feeling that politics were clearing up a little there will be some pleasure in voting for a gentleman who speaks in that honorable manner well as you know mr. mormsey you would find it the right thing to put yourself on our side this reform will touch everybody by and by a thoroughly popular measure a sort of a bc you know the must come first before the rest can follow i quite agree with you that you've got to look at the thing in a family light but public spirit now we're all one family you know it's all one cupboard such a thing as a vote now why it may help to make men's fortunes at the cape there's no knowing what may be the effect of a vote mr. brook ended with a sense of being a little out at sea though still finding it enjoyable but mr. mormsey answered in a tone of decisive check i beg your pardon sir but i can't afford that when i give a vote i must know what i'm doing i must look to what will be the effects on my till and they're just speaking respectfully prices i'll admit are what nobody can know the merits of and the sudden falls after you've bought in currents which are a goods that will not keep i've never myself seen into the ins and outs there which is a rebuked human pride but as to one family there's debtor and creditor i hope they're not going to reform that away also should vote for things staying as they are few men have less need to cry for change than i have personally speaking that is for self and family i am not one of those who have nothing to lose i mean as the respectability in both parish and private business and no ways in respect of your honorable self and custom which you was good enough to say you would not withdraw from me vote or no vote while the article sent him was satisfactory after this conversation mr. mormsey went and boasted to his wife that he had been rather too many for brook of tipton and that he didn't mind so much now about going to the poll mr brook on this occasion abstained from boasting of his tactics to ladderslaw who for his part was glad enough to persuade himself that he had no concern with any canvassing except the purely argumentative sort and that he worked no meaner engine than knowledge mr. brook necessarily had his agents who understood the nature of the middle march voter and the means of enlisting his ignorance on the side of the bill which were remarkably similar to the means of enlisting it on the side against the bill will stop his ears occasionally parliament like the rest of our lives even to our eating and apparel could hardly go on if our imaginations were too active about processes there were plenty of dirty handed men in the world to do dirty business and will protested to himself that his share in bringing mr brook through would be quite innocent but whether he should succeed in that mode of contributing to the majority on the right side was very doubtful to him he had written out various speeches and memorandum for speeches but he had begun to perceive that mr brook's mind if it had the burden of remembering any train of thought would let it drop run away in search of it and not easily come back again to collect documents is one mode of serving a country and to remember the contents of a document is another no the only way in which mr brook could be coerced into thinking of the right arguments at the right time was to be well-plied with them till they took up all the room in his brain but here though was the difficulty of finding room so many things having been taken in beforehand mr brook himself observed that his ideas stood rather in his way when he was speaking however ladislaw's coaching was forthwith to be put to the test for before the day of nomination mr brook was to explain himself to the worthy electors of middle march from the balcony of the white heart which looked out advantageously at an angle of the marketplace commanding a large area in front and two converging streets it was a fine may morning and everything seemed hopeful there was some prospect or an understanding between bagsters committee in brooks to which mr bolsteroed mr standish as a liberal lawyer and such manufacturers as mr plimdale and mr vincy gave a solidity which almost counterbalanced mr hawley and his associates who sat for pinkerton at the green dragon mr brook conscious of having weakened the blasts of the trumpet against him by his reforms as a landlord in the last half year and hearing himself cheered a little as he drove into the town felt his heart tolerably light under his buff-colored waistcoat but with regard to critical occasions it often happens at all moments seem comfortably remote until the last this looks well a said mr brook as the crowd gathered i shall have a good audience at any rate i like this now this kind of public made up a one's own neighbors you know the weavers and tanners of middlemarch unlike mr warmsey had never thought of brook as a neighbor and were not more attached to him than if he had been sent in a box from london but they listened without much disturbance to the speakers who introduced the candidate one of them a political personage from brassing who came to tell middlemarch its duty spoke so fully that it was alarming to think what the candidate could find to say after him meanwhile the crowd became denser and as the political personage near the end of his speech mr brook felt a remarkable change in his sensations while he still handled his eyeglass trifled with documents before him and exchanged remarks with his committee as a man to whom the moment of summons was indifferent i'll take another glass of sherry ladislaw he said with an easy air to will who was close behind him and presently handed him the supposed fortifier it was ill-chosen for mr brook was an upstreamious man and to drink a second glass of sherry quickly at no great interval from the first was a surprise to his system which tended to scatter his energies instead of collecting them pray pity him so many english gentlemen make themselves miserable by speechifying on entirely private grounds whereas mr brook wished to serve his country by standing for parliament which indeed may also be done on private grounds but being once undertaken does absolutely demand some speechifying it was not about the beginning of his speech that mr brook was at all anxious this he felt sure would be all right he should have it quite pat cut out as neatly as a set of couplets from pope embarking would be easy but the vision of open sea that might come after was alarming and questions now hinted the demon just waking up in his stomach somebody may put questions about the schedules ladislaw he continued allowed just hand me the memorandum of the schedules when mr brook presented himself on the balcony the cheers were quite loud enough to counterbalance the yells groans brings and other expressions of adverse theory which was so moderate that mr standish decidedly an old bird observed in the year next to him this looks dangerous by god all he's got some deeper plan than this still the cheers were exhilarating and no candidate could look more amiable than mr brook with the memorandum in his breast pocket his left hand on the rail of the balcony and his right trifling with styglass the striking points in his appearance were his buff waistcoat short clipped blonde hair and neutral physiognomy he began with some confidence gentlemen electors of middle march this was so much the right thing that a little pause after it seemed natural i'm uncommon the glad to be here i was never so proud and happy in my life never so happy you know this was a bold figure of speech but not exactly the right thing for unhappily the pat opening had slipped away even couplets from pope maybe but fallings from us vanishings when fear clutches us and a glass of sherry is hurrying like smoke among our ideas lattice law who stood at the window behind the speaker thought it's all up now the only chance is that since the best thing won't always do floundering may answer for once mr brook meanwhile having lost other clues fell back on himself and his qualifications always an appropriate graceful subject for a candidate i'm a close neighbor of yours my good friends you've known me on the bench a good while i've always gone a good deal into public questions machinery now and machine breaking you many of you concerned with machinery and have been going into that lately it won't do you know breaking machines everything must go on trade manufacturers commerce interchange of staples that kind of thing since adam smith that must go on we must look all over the globe observation with an extensive views must look everywhere from china to prune as somebody says johnson i think the rambler you know that is what i've done up to a certain point not as far as peru but i've not always stayed at home i saw it wouldn't do i've been in the levant where some of your middle march goods go and then again in the Baltic the Baltic now lying among his recollections in this way mr brook might have got along easily to himself and would have come back from the remotest seas without trouble but a diabolical procedure had been set up by the enemy at one in the same moment there had risen above the shoulders of the crowd nearly opposite mr brook and within ten yards of him the effigy of himself buffered waistcoat eyeglass and neutral physiognomy painted on a rag and there had arisen apparently in the air like the note of a cuckoo a parrot like punched voiced echo of his words everybody looked up at the open windows and the houses at the opposite angles of the converging streets but they were either blank or filled by laughing listeners the most innocent echo has an impish mockery in it when it follows a gravely persistent speaker and this echo was not at all innocent if it did not follow with the precision of a natural echo it had a wicked choice of the words it overtook by the time it said the Baltic now the laugh which had been running through the audience became a general shout and but for the sobering effects of party and that great public cause which the entanglement of things had identified with brook of tipton a laugh might have caught his committee mr bolstero asked reprehensively what the new police were doing but a voice could not well be collared and an attack on the effigy of the candidate would have been too equivocal since holy probably meant it to be pelted mr brook himself was not in a position to be quickly conscious of anything except a general slipping away of ideas within himself he had even a little singing in the ears and he was the only person who had not yet taken a distinct account of the echo or discerned the image of himself few things hold the perceptions more thoroughly captive than anxiety about what we have got to say mr brook heard the laughter but he had expected some Tory efforts of disturbance and he was at this moment additionally excited by the tickling stinging sense that his last exorbitant was coming back to fetch him from the Baltic that reminds me he went on thrusting a hand into his side pocket with an easy air if i wanted a precedent you know but we never want a precedent for the right thing but there is chatham now i can't say i should have supported chatham or pit the younger pit he was not a man of ideas and we want ideas you know blast your ideas we want the bills a loud rough voice from the crowd below immediately the invisible punch who had his or two followed mr brook repeated blast your ideas we want the bill the laugh was louder than ever and for the first time mr brook being himself silent heard distinctly the mocking echo but it seemed to ridicule his interrupter and in that light was encouraging so he replied with amenity there is something in what you say my good friend and what do we meet for but to speak our minds freedom of opinion freedom of the press liberty that kind of thing the bill now you shall have the bill here mr brook paused a moment to fix his eye on his eyeglass and take the paper from his breast pocket with a sense of being practical and coming to particulars the invisible punch followed you shall have the bill mr brook per electioneering contest in the seat outside parliament as delivered five thousand pounds seven shillings and four pens mr brook amid the rows of laughter turned red the letters eyeglass fall and looking about him confusedly saw the image of himself which had come nearer the next moment he saw it dollar asleep his spattered with eggs his spirit rose a little and his voice too buffoonery tricks ridicule the test of truth all that is very well here an unpleasant egg broke on mr brook's shoulder as the echo said oh that is very well then came a hail of eggs chiefly aimed at the image but occasionally hitting the original as if by chance there was a stream of new men pushing among the crowd whistles yells bellowings and fives made all the greater hubbub because they were shouting and struggling to put them down no voice could have had a wing enough to rise above the upro and mr brook disagreeably anointed stood his ground no longer the frustration would have been less exasperating if it had been less gamesome and boyish a serious assault of which the newspaper reporter can aver that it endangered the learned gentleman's ribs or can respectfully bear witness to the souls of that gentleman's boots having been visible above the railing has perhaps more consolations attached to it mr brook re-entered the committee room saying as carelessly as he could this is a little too bad you know i should have got the ear of the people by and by but they didn't give me time i should have gone into the bill by and by you know he added glancing at ladderslaw however things will come all right at the nomination but it was not resolved unanimously that things would come right on the contrary the committee looked rather grim and the political personage from brassing was writing busily as if he were brewing new devices it was bowyer who did it said mr standish evasively i know it as well as if he had been advertised he's uncommonly good at ventriloquism and he did it uncommonly well but god all he has been having into dinner lately is there's a fund of talent in bowyer well you know you never mentioned him to me standish else i would have invited him to dine said poor mr brook who had gone through a great deal of inviting for the good of his country there's not a more paltry fellow in middle march than bowyer said ladderslaw indignantly but it seems as if the paltry fellows always determined the scale will was thoroughly out of tempo with himself as well as with his principal and he went to shut himself in his rooms with a half formed resolve to throw up the pioneer and mr brook together why should he stay if the impassable gulf between himself and dorotheo were ever to be filled up it must rather be by his going away and getting into a thoroughly different position than by staying here and slipping into deserved contempt as an understrapper of brooks then came the young dream of wonders that he might do in five years for example political writing political speaking would get a higher value now public life was going to be wider and more national and they might give him such distinction that he would not seem to be asking dorotheo to step down to him five years if he could only be sure that she cared for him more than for others if he could only make her aware that he stood aloof until he could tell his love without lowering himself then he could go away easily and begin a career which at five and twenty seemed probable enough in the inward order of things where talent brings fame and fame everything else which is delightful he could speak and he could write he could master any subject if he chose and he meant always to take the side of reason and justice on which he would carry all his order why should he not one day be lifted above the shoulders of the crowd and feel that he had won that eminence well without a doubt he would leave middle-march go to town and make himself fit for celebrity by eating his dinners but not immediately not until some kind of sign had passed between him and Dorothea he could not be satisfied until she knew why even if he were the man she would choose to marry he would not marry her hence he must keep his post and bear with mr. brook a little longer but he soon had reason to suspect that mr. brook had anticipated him in the wish to break up their connection deputations without and voices within had concurred in inducing that philanthropist to take a stronger measure than usual for the good of mankind namely to withdraw in favor of another candidate to whom he left the advantages of his canvassing machinery he himself called this a strong measure but observed that his health was less capable of sustaining excitement than he had imagined i've felt uneasy about the chest it won't do to carry that too far he said to let us learn explaining the affair i must pull up poor kassabon was a warning you know i've made some heavy advances but i've dug a channel it's rather coarse work this electioneering eh lettuce law desa you're tired of it however we have dug a channel with the pioneer put things in a track and so on a more ordinary man than you might carry it on now more ordinary you know do you wish me to give it up said will a quick color coming in his face as he rose from the writing table and took a turn of three steps with his hands in his pockets i am ready to do so whenever you wish it as to wishing my dear lettuce law i have the highest opinion of your powers you know but about the pioneer i've been consulting a little with some of the men on our side and they are inclined to take it into their homes indentify me to a certain extent carry it on in fact and under the circumstances you might like to give up might find a better field these people might not take that high view of you which i have always taken as an alter ego or a right hand though i always looked forward to your doing something else i think of having a run into france but i'll write you any letters you know to althorpe and people of that kind i've met althorpe i'm exceedingly obliged to you so let us look proudly since you are going to part with the pioneer i did not trouble you about the steps i shall take i may choose to continue here for the present after mr brook had left will said to himself the rest of the family have been urging him to get rid of me and he doesn't care now about my going i shall stay as long as i like i shall go of my own movements and not because they are afraid of me end of chapter 51 chapter 52 of middle march this is a libra vox recording all libra vox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit libravox.org middle march by george elliott chapter 52 his heart the lowliest duties on itself delay wordsworth on that june evening when mr fairbrother knew that he was to have the lowick living there was joy in the old fashioned parlor and even the portraits of the great lawyers seem to look on with satisfaction his mother left her tea and toast untouched but sat with her usual pretty primeness only showing her emotion by that flesh in the cheeks and brightness in the eyes which give an old woman a touching momentary identity with her far off youthful self and saying decisively the great comfort camden is that you have deserved it when a man gets a good birth mother half the deserving must come after said the son prim full of pleasure and not trying to conceal it the gladness in his face was of that active kind which seems to have energy enough not only to flash outwardly but to light up busy vision within one seemed to see thoughts as well as delight in his glances now aren't he went on rubbing his hands and looking at mr noble who was making tender little beaver like noises there shall be sugar candy always on the table for you to steal and give to the children and you shall have a great many new stockings to make presents of and you shall darn your own more than ever miss noble nodded at her nephew with a subdued half frightened laugh conscious of having already dropped an additional lump of sugar into her basket on the strength of the new preferment as for you winnie the vicar went on i shall make no difficulty about your marrying any lowek bachelor mr salman featherstone for example as soon as i find you're in love with him miss winifred who had been looking at her brother all the while and crying heartily which was her way of rejoicing smiled through her tears and said you must set me the example cam you must marry now with all my heart but who is in love with me i'm a seedy old fellow said the vicar rising pushing his chair away and looking down at himself what do you say mother you're a handsome man camden they're not so fine a figure of a man as your father said the old lady i wish you would marry miss garth brother said miss winifred she would make us so lively at lowek very fine you talk as if young women were tied up to be chosen like poultry at market as if i had only to ask and everybody would have me said the vicar not caring to specify we don't want everybody said miss winifred but you would like miss garth mother shouldn't you my son's choice shall be mine said mrs fair brother with majestic discretion and a wife would be most welcome camden you'll want your wist at home when we go to lowek and henry at a noble never was a wist player miss fair brother always called her tiny old sister by that magnificent name i shall do without wist now mother why so camden in my time wist was thought an undeniable amusement for a good churchman said mrs fair brother innocent of the meaning that wist had for her son and speaking rather sharply has at some dangerous countenancing of new doctrine i shall be too busy for wist i shall have two parishes said the vicar preferring not to discuss the virtues of that game he had already said to dorothea i don't feel bound to give up some bottles it is protest enough against the pluralism they want to reform if i give somebody else most of the money the stronger thing is not to give up power but to use it well i have thought of that so dorothea so far as self is concerned i think it would be easier to give up power and money than to keep them it seems very unfitting that i should have this patronage yet i felt that i ought not to let it be used by someone else instead of me it is i who am bound to act so that you will not regret your power said mr fair brother his was one of the natures in which conscience gets the more active when the yoke of life ceases to call them he made no display of humility on the subject but in his heart he felt rather ashamed that his conduct had shown lashes which others who did not get benefits were free from i used often to wish i had been something else than a clergyman he said to lidgate but perhaps it will be better to try and make as good a clergyman out of myself as i can that is the well benefit point of view you perceive from which difficulties are much simplified he ended smiling the vicar did feel then as if his share of duties would be easy but duty has a trick of behaving unexpectedly something like a heavy friend whom we have amably asked to visit us and who breaks his leg within our gates hardly a week later duty presented itself in his study under the disguise of fred vincy now returned from omnibus college with his bachelor's degree i'm ashamed to trouble you mr fair brother said fred whose fair open face was propitiating but you were the only friend i can consult i told you everything once before and you were so good that i can't help coming to you again sit down fred i'm ready to hear and do anything i can said the vicar who was busy packing some small objects for removal and went on with his work i wanted to tell you fred hesitated at instant and then went on plungingly i might go into the church now and really look where i may i can't see anything else to do i don't like it but i know it's uncommonly hard on my father to say so after he has spent a good deal of money in educating me for it fred paused again an instance and then repeated that i can't see anything else to do i did talk to your father about it fred but i made a little way with him he said it was too late but you have got over one bridge now what are your other difficulties merely that i don't like it i don't like divinity and preaching and feeling obliged to look serious i like riding across country and doing as other men do i don't mean that i want to be a bad fellow in any way but i have no taste for the sort of thing people expect of a clergyman and yet what else am i to do my father can't spare me any capital else i might go into farming but he has no room for me in his trade and of course i can't begin to study for law or physics now when my father wants me to earn something it's all very well to say him wrong to go into the church but those who say so might as well tell me to go into the backwards fred's voice had taken a tone of grumbling remonstrance and mr fairbrother might have been inclined to smile if his mind had not been too busy in imagining more than fred told him that have you any difficulties about doctrines about the articles he said trying hard to think of the questions simply for fred's sake no i suppose the articles are right i am not prepared with any arguments to disprove them and much better clever of fellows than i am going for them entirely i think it would be rather ridiculous in me to urge scruples of that sort as if i were a judge said fred quite simply i suppose then it has occurred to you that you might be a fair parish priest without being much of a divine of course if i'm obliged to be a clergyman i should try and do my duty though i may not like it do you think anybody ought to blame me for going into the church under the circumstances that depends on your conscience fred how far you have counted the cost and seen what your position will require of you i can only tell you about myself that i have always been too lax and have been uneasy in consequence but there is another hindrance said fred coloring i did not tell you before though perhaps i may have said things that made you guess it there is somebody i am very fond of i have loved her ever since we were children misgarth i suppose said the vicar examining some labels very closely yes i shouldn't mind anything if she would have me and i know i could be a good fellow then and you think she returns the feeling well she never will say so and a good while ago she made me promise not to speak to her about it again and she has set her mind especially against my being a clergyman i know that but i can't give her up i do think she cares about me i saw mrs. garth last night and she said that mary was staying at lowek rectory with miss fairbrother yes she is very kindly helping my sister do you wish to go there no i want to ask a great favor of you i am ashamed to bother you in this way but mary might listen to what you said if you mentioned the subject to her i mean about my going into the church that is rather a delicate task my dear fred i shall have to presuppose your attachment to her and to enter on the subject as you wish me to do will be asking her to tell me whether she returns it that is what i wanted to tell you said fred bluntly i don't know what to do unless i can get at her feeling you mean that you will be guided by that as you're going into the church if mary said she would never have me i might as well go wrong one way as another that is nonsense fred men outlive their love but they don't outlive the consequences of their recklessness not my sort of love i've never been without loving mary if i had to give her up it would be like beginning to live on wooden legs will she not be hurt at my intrusion no i feel sure she will not she respects you more than anyone and she would not put you off with fun as she does me of course i could not have told anyone else or asked anyone else to speak to her but you there is no one else who could be such a friend to both of us fred paused a moment and then said rather complainingly and she ought to acknowledge that i worked in order to pass she ought to believe that i would exert myself for her sake there was a moment of silence before mr fairbrother laid down his work and putting out his hand to fred so very well my boy i will do what you wish that very day mr fairbrother went to loweke parsonage on the nag which he had just set up decidedly i am an old stalk he thought the young growths are pushing me aside he found mary in the garden gathering roses and sprinkling the petals on a sheet the sun was low and tall trees sent their shadows across the grassy walks where mary was moving without bonnet or parasol she did not observe mr fairbrother's approach along the grass and had just stooped down to lecture a small black and tan terrier which would persist in walking on the sheet and smelling at the rose leaves as mary sprinkled them she took his forepaws in one hand and lifted up the forefinger of the other while the dog wrinkled his brows and looked embarrassed fly fly i am ashamed of you mary was saying in a grave-controller this is not becoming an insensible dog anyone would think you are a silly young gentleman you are unmerciful to young gentleman miss garth said the vicar within two yards of her mary started up and blushed it always answers to reason with fly she said laughingly but not with young gentleman oh with some i suppose and some of them turn into excellent men i'm glad of that admission because i want at this very moment to interest you and young gentleman not a silly one i hope said mary beginning to pluck the roses again and feeling her heart beat uncomfortably no though perhaps wisdom is not his strong point but rather affection and sincerity however wisdom lies more in those two qualities than people are apt to imagine i hope you know by those marks what young gentleman i mean yes i think i do said mary bravely her face getting more serious and her hands cold it must be fred vincey he has asked me to consult you about his going into the church i hope you will not think that i consented to take a liberty in promising to do so on the contrary mr. fairbrother said mary giving up the roses and folding her arms but unable to look up whenever you have anything to say to me i feel honored but before i enter on that question let me just touch a point on which your father took me into confidence by the way it was that very evening on which i once before fulfilled the mission from fred just after he had gone to college mr. garth told me what happened on the night of feather since death how you refused to burn the will and he said that you had some heartbreakings on that subject because you had been innocent means of hindering fred from getting his ten thousand pounds i have kept that in mind and i have heard something that may relieve you on that score may show you that no sin offerings demanded from you there mr. fairbrother paused a moment and looked at mary he meant to give fred his full advantage but it would be well he thought to clear her mind of any superstitions such as women sometimes follow when they do a man the wrong of marrying him as an act of atonement mary's cheeks had begun to burn a little and she was mute i mean that your action made no real difference to fred's lot i find that the first will would not have been legally good after the burning of the last it would not have stood if it had been disputed and you may be sure it would have been disputed so on that score you may feel your mind free thank you mr. fairbrother said mary honestly i'm grateful to you for remembering my feelings well now i may go on fred you know has taken his degree he's worked his way so far and now the question is what is he to do that question is so difficult that he is inclined to follow his father's wishes and enter the church though you know better than i do that he was quite set against that formally i have questioned him on the subject and i confess i see no insufferable objection to his being a clergyman as things go he says that he could turn his mind to doing his best in that vocation on one condition if that condition were fulfilled i would do my utmost in helping fred on after a time not of course at first he might be with me as my curate and he would have so much to do that his stipend will be nearly what i used to get as vicar but i repeat that there is a condition without which all this good cannot come to pass he has opened his heart to me miss garth and asked me to plead for him the condition lies entirely in your feeling mary looked so much moved that he said after a moment let us walk a little and when they were walking he added to speak quite plainly fred will not take any course which would lessen the chance that you would consent to be his wife but with that prospect he will try his best at anything you approve i cannot possibly say that i will ever be his wife mr fair brother but i certainly never will be his wife if he becomes a clergyman what you say is most generous and kind i don't mean for a moment to correct your judgment it is only that i have my girlish mocking way of looking at things said mary with a returning sparkle of playfulness in her answer which only made its modesty more charming he wishes me to report exactly what you think said mr fair brother i could not love a man who is ridiculous said mary not choosing to go deeper fred has sense and knowledge enough to make him respectable if he likes and some good worldly business but i can never imagine him preaching and exhorting and pronouncing blessings and praying by the sick without feeling as if i were looking at a caricature his being a clergyman would only be for gentility's sake and i think there is nothing more contemptible than a such imbecile gentility i used to think that of mr krauss with his empty face and neat umbrella and mincing little speeches what right of such men to represent christianity as if it were an institution for getting up idiots gentility as if mary checked herself she'd been carried along as if she had been speaking to fred instead of mr fair brother young women are severe they don't feel the stress of action as men do though perhaps i ought to make you an exception there but you don't put fred vency on solo level as that no indeed he has plenty of sense but i think he would not show it as a clergyman he would be a piece of professional affectation then the answer is quite decided as a clergyman who could have no hope mary shook her head but if he braved all the difficulties of getting his bread in some other way will you give him the support of hope may he count on winning you i think fred ought not to need telling again what i have already said to him mary answered with a slight resentment in her manner i mean that he ought not to put such questions until he has done something worthy instead of saying that he could do it mr fair brother was silent for a minute or more and then as they turned and paused under the shadow of a maple at the end of a grassy walk said i understand that you resist any attempt to fete you but either your feeling for fred vency excludes your entertaining another attachment or it does not either he may count on your remaining single until he shall have earned your hand or he may in any case be disappointed pardon me mary you know i used to catatise you under that name but when the state of a woman's affections touches the happiness of another life of more lies than one i think it would be the nobler course for her to be perfectly direct and open mary and her tone was silent wondering not at mr fair brother's manner but at his tone which had a grave restrained emotion in it when the strange idea flashed across her that his words had reference to himself she was incredulous and ashamed of entertaining it she had never thought that any man could love her except fred who had espoused her with the umbrella ring when she wore socks and little strapped shoes still less that she could be of any importance to mr fair brother the cleverest man in her narrow circle she had only time to feel that all this was hazy and perhaps a loser but one thing was clear and determined her answer since you think it my duty mr fair brother i will tell you that i have too strong a feeling for fred to give him up for anyone else i should never be quite happy if i thought he was unhappy for the loss of me it has taken such deep root in me my gratitude to him for always loving me best and minding so much if i hurt myself from time to time when we were very little i cannot imagine any new feeling coming to make that weaker i should like better than anything to see him worthy of everyone's respect but please tell him i will not promise to marry him to len i should shame and grieve my father and mother he is free to choose someone else and i fulfilled my commission thoroughly said mr fair brother putting out his hand to marry and i shall ride back to middle march forthwith with this prospect before him we shall get fred into the right niche somehow and i hope i should live to join your hands god bless you oh please stay and let me give you some tea said mary her eyes filled with tears for something indefinable something like the resolute suppression of a pain in mr fair brother's manner made her feel suddenly miserable when she had once felt when she saw her father's hands trembling in a moment of trouble no my dear no i must get back in three minutes the vicar was on horseback again having gone magnanimously through a duty much harder than the renunciation of wist or even in the writing of penitential meditations end of chapter 52 this is a librivox recording all librivox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please contact librivox.org george elliot middle march chapter 53 it is but a shallow haste which concludes insincerity from what outsiders call inconsistency putting a dead mechanism of ifs and their force for the living myriad of hidden suckers whereby the belief and the conduct are wrought into mutual sustainment mr balstrode when he was hoping to acquire a new interest in loic had naturally had a special wish that the new clergyman should be one whom he thoroughly approved and he believed it to be a chastisement an admonition directed to his own shortcomings and those of the nation at large that just about the time when he came in possession of the deeds which made him the proprietor of stone court mr fair brother read himself into the quaint little church and preached his first sermon to the congregation of farmers labors and village artisans it was not that mr balstroy intended to frequent loic church or to reside at stone court for a good while to come he had bought the excellent farm and fine homestead simply as a retreat which he might gradually enlarge as to the land and beautify as to the dwelling until it should be conducive to the divine glory that he should enter on it as a residence partially withdrawing from his present exertions in the administration of business and throwing more conspicuously on the side of gospel truth the weight of local landed proprietorship which providence might increase by unforeseen occasions of purchase a strong leading in this direction seem to have been given in the surprising facility of getting stone court when everyone had expected that mr rig feather stone would have clung to it as the garden of eden that was what poor old peter himself had expected having often in imagination looked up through the salts above him and unobstructed by perspective seen his frog faced legati enjoying the final place to the perpetual surprise and disappointment of others' survivors but how little we know what would make paradise for our neighbors we judge from our own desires and our neighbors themselves are not always open enough even to throw out a hint of theirs the cool and judicious joshua rick had not allowed his parents to perceive that stone court was anything less than the chief good in his estimation and he had certainly wished to call it his own but as warren hastings looked at gold and thought of buying deli's ford so joshua rig looked at stone court and thought of buying gold he had a very distinct and intensive vision of his chief good the vigorous greed which he had inherited having taken a special form by dint of circumstance and his chief good was to be a money changer from his earliest employment as an errand boy in a seaport he had looked through the windows of the money changers as other boys looked through the windows of the pastry cooks the fascination had wrought itself gradually into a deep special passion he meant when he had property to do many things one of them being to marry a gentile young person but these were all accidents and joys that imagination could dispense with the one joy after which his soul thirsted was to have a money changers shop on a much frequented k to have locks all around him of which he held the keys and to look sublime to cool as he handled the breeding coins of all nations while helpless cupidity looked at him enviously from the other side of an iron lattice the strength of that passion had been a power enabling him to master all the knowledge necessary to gratify it and when others were thinking that he had settled at stone court for life joshua himself was thinking that the moment now was not far off when he should settle in the north k with the best appointments in saves and locks enough we are concerned with looking at joshua rig's sale of his land from mr bolster's point of view and he interpreted it as a cheering dispense sensation conveying perhaps a sanction to a purpose which he had for some time entertained without external encouragement he interpreted it thus but not too confidentially offering up his thanksgiving in guarded phraseology his doubts did not arise from the possible relations of the event to joshua rig's destiny which belonged to the unmapped regions not taken under the providential government except perhaps in an imperfect colonial way but they arose from reflecting that this dispensation to might be a chastisement for himself as mrs fairbrothers induction to the living clearly was this was not what mr bolster said to any man for the sake of deceiving him it was what he said to himself it was asked genuinely his mode of explaining events as any theory of yours may be if you happen to disagree with him for the egoism which enters into our theories does not affect their sincerity rather the more our egoism is satisfied the more robust is our belief however whether for sanction or for chastisement mr bolster hardly fifteen months after the death of peter featherstone had become the proprietor of stone court and what peter would say if he were worthy to know had become an inexhaustible and consolatory subject of conversation to his disappointed relatives the tables were now turned on that dear brother departed and to contemplate the frustration of his cunning by the superior cunning of things in general was a scud of delight to solomon mrs wall had a melancholy triumph in the proof that it did not answer to make false featherstones and cut off the genuine and sister martha receiving the news in the chalky flat said dear dear then the almighty could have been none so pleased with the alms houses after all affectionate mrs bolster was particularly glad of the advantage which her husband's health was likely to get from the purchase of stone court few days passed without his riding dither and looking over some part of the farm with a bailiff and the evenings were delicious in that quiet spot when the new hay ricks lately set up were sending forth odours to mingle with the breath of the rich old garden one evening while the sun was still above the horizon and burning it in golden lamps among the great warlord boss mr bolster was pausing on horseback outside the front gate waiting for calla garth who had met him by appointment to give an opinion on a question of stable drainage and was now advising the bailiff in the rickyard mr bolster was conscious of being in good spiritual frame and more than usually serene under the influence of his innocent recreation he was doctrinally convinced that there was a total absence of merit in himself but that doctrinal conviction may be held without paying when the sense of demerit does not take a distinct shape in memory and revive the tingling of shame or the pang of remorse nay it may be held with intense satisfaction when the depth of our sinning is but a measure of the depth of forgiveness and a clenching proof that we are peculiar instruments of the divine intention the memory has as many moods as the temper and shifts scenery like a diorama at this moment mr bolster felt as if the sunshine were all one with that of far off evenings when he was a very young man and used to guard preaching beyond hybrid and he would willingly have had that service of exhortation in prospect now the text were there still and so was his own facility in expanding them his brief reverie was interrupted by the return of calla garth who also wasn't horseback and was just shaking his bridle before starting when he exclaimed bless my heart what's this fellow in black coming along the lane he's like one of those men once he's about after the races mr bolster turned his horse and looked along the lane but made no reply the comer was our slight acquaintance mr raffles whose appearance presented no other change than such as was due to a suit of black and a crepe hat brand he was within three yards of the horseman now and they could see the flash of recognition in his face as he whirled his stick upward looking all the while at mr bolster and at last exclaiming my joe nick it's you i couldn't be mistaken though the five and twenty years have played old bogey with us both how are you a you didn't expect to see me here come shake us by their hand to say that mr raffles manner was rather excited would be only one mode of saying that it was evening calla garth could see that there was a moment of struggle and hesitation in mr bolster but it ended in his putting out his hand coldly to raffles and saying i did not indeed expect to see you in this remote country place well it belongs to step son of mine said raffles adjusting himself in a swaggering attitude i came to see him here before i'm not so surprised seeing you old fellow because i picked up a letter what you may call a providential thing it's uncommonly fortunate i met you though for i don't care about seeing my stepson he's not affectionate and his poor mother's gone now to tell the truth i came out of love to you nick i came to get your address for look here raffles threw a crumpled paper from his pocket almost any other man than calla garth might have been tempted to linger on the spot for the sake of hearing all he could about a man whose acquaintance with bolster would seem to imply passages in the bankers life so unlike anything that was known of him in middle march that they must have the nature of a secret to peak curiosity but calla was peculiar certain human tendencies which are commonly strong were almost absent from his mind and one of these was curiosity about personal affairs especially if there was anything discreditable to be found out concerning another man calla preferred not to know it and if he had to tell anybody under him that his evil doings were discovered he was more embarrassed than the culprit he now spurred his horse and saying i wish you good evening mr bolster i must be getting home and set off at a trot you didn't put your full address to this letter raffles continued that was not like the first straight man of business you used to be the shrubs they may be anywhere you live near at hand a have cut the london concern altogether perhaps turn country squire have a rural mansion to invite me to lord how many years it is ago the old lady must have been dead a pretty long while gone to glory without the pain of knowing how poor her daughter was a but by joe you're very pale and pasty nick come if you're going home i'll walk by your side mr bolster's usual paleness had in fact taken an almost deathly hue five minutes before the expanse of his life had been submerged in its evening sunshine which shone backwards to its remembered morning sin seemed to be a question of doctrine and inward penitence humiliation and exercise of the closest the bearing of his deeds a matter of private vision adjusted solely by spiritual relations and conceptions of the divine purposes and now as if by some hideous magic this loud red figure had risen before him in an unmanageable solidity an incorporate past which had not entered into his imagination of chastisements but mr bolster's thought was busy and he was not a man to act or speak rushly i was going home he said but i can defer my ride a little and you can if you please rest here thank you said raffles making your grimace i don't care now about seeing my stepson i'd rather go home with you your stepson if mr rig featherstone was he is here no longer i'm master here now raffles opened wide eyes and gave a long whistle of surprise before he said well then i've no objection i've had enough walking from the coach road i never was much of a walker or a rider either what i like is a smart vehicle and a spirited cob i was always a little heavy in the saddle what a pleasant surprise it must be to you to see me old fellow he continued as they turned towards the house you don't say so but you never took your luck heartily you were all thinking of improving the occasion you'd such a gift for improving your luck mr raffles seemed greatly to enjoy his own wit and swung his leg in a swaggering manner which was rather too much for his companions judicious patience if i remember rightly mr bolstered absurd with chill anger our acquaintance many years ago had not the sort of intimacy which you are now assuming mr raffles any services you desire of me will be the more readily rendered if you will avoid a tone of familiarity which did not lie in our former intercourse and can hardly be warranted by more than 20 years of separation you don't like being called nick why i always called your nick in my heart and though lost to sight to memory dear by joe my feelings have ripened for you like fine old cognac i hope you've got some in the house now josh filled my flask well the last time mr bolstered had not yet fully learned that even the desire for cognac was not stronger in raffles than the desire to torment and that a hint of annoyance always served him as a fresh cue but it was at least clear that further objection was useless and mr bolstered in giving orders to the housekeeper for the accommodation of the guest had a resolute air or quietude there was the comfort of thinking that this housekeeper had been in the service of rig also and might accept the idea that mr bolstered entertained raffles merely as a friend of our former master when there was food and drink spread before his visitor in the wainscoted parlor and no witness in the room mr bolstered said your habits and mine are so different mr raffles that we can hardly enjoy each other's society the wisest plan for both of us will therefore be to part as soon as possible since you say that you wish to meet me you probably considered that you had some business to transact with me but under the circumstances i will invite you to remain here for the night and i will myself ride over here early tomorrow morning before breakfast in fact when i can receive any communication you have to make to me with all my heart said raffles this is a comfortable place a little dull for a continuance but i can put up with it for a night with this good liquor and the prospect of seeing you again in the morning you're a much better host than my stepson was but your showed me a bit of grudge for marrying his mother and between you and me there was never anything but kindness mr bolstered hoping that the peculiar mixture of joviality and sneering in raffles manner was a good deal the effect of drink had determined to wait till he was quite sober before he spent more words upon him but he wrote home with a terribly lucid vision of the difficulty there would be in arranging any result that could be permanently counted on with this man it was inevitable that he should wish to get rid of john raffles though his reappearance could not be regarded as lying outside the divine plan the spirit of evil might have sent him to threaten mr bolstered subversion as an instrument of good but the threat must have been permitted and was a chastisement of a new kind it was an hour of anguish for him very different from the hours in which his struggle had been securely private and which had ended with a sense that his secret misdeeds were pardoned and his services accepted those misdeeds even when committed had they not been half sanctified by the singleness of his desire to devote himself and all he possessed to the furtherance of the divine scheme and was he after all to become a mere stone of stumbling and a rock of offense for who would understand the work within him who would not when there was the pretext of casting disgrace upon him confound his whole life and the truth he had exposed in one heap of a block queen in his closest meditations the lifelong habit of mr bolster's mind clad his most egoistic terrors in doctrinal references to superhuman ends but even while we are talking and meditating about the earth's orbit and the solar system what we feel and adjust our movements to is the stable earth and the changing day and now when all the automatic succession of theoretic phrases distinct and inmost at the shiver of the ache of oncoming fever when we are discussing abstract pain was the forecast of disgrace in the presence of his neighbors and of his own wife for the pain as well as the public estimate of disgrace depends on the amount of previous profession to men who only aim at escaping felony nothing short of the prisoner's dock is disgrace but mr bolster had aimed at being an eminent christian it was not more than half past seven in the morning when he again reached stone court the fine old place never looked more like a delightful home than at the moment the great white lilies were in flower the nastormious their pretty leaves all silvered with dew were running away over the low stone wall the very noises all around had a heart of peace within them but everything was spoiled for the owner as he walked on the gravel in front and awaited the descent of mr raffles with whom he was condemned to breakfast it was not long before they were seated together in the wainscoted parlor over their tea and toast which was as much as raffles care to take at that earlier hour the difference between his morning and evening self was not so great as his companion had imagined that it might be the delight in tormenting was perhaps even the stronger because his spirits were rather less highly pitched certainly his manners seemed more disagreeable by the morning to light as i have little time to spare mr raffles said the banker who could hardly do more than sip his tea and break his toast without eating it i shall be obliged if you will mention at once the ground on which you wish to meet me with me i presume that you have a home elsewhere and will be glad to return to it why if a man has got any heart doesn't he want to see an old friend nick i must call you nick we always did call you jung nick when we knew you meant to marry the old widow some said you had a handsome family likeness to old nick but that was your mother's fault calling you nicolas aren't you glad to see me again i expected an invite to stay with you at some pretty place my own establishment is broken up now my wife's dead i have no particular attachment to any spot i would have soon settled here about us anywhere may i ask why you returned from america i consider that the strong wish you expressed to go there when an adequate sum was furnished was tantamount to an engagement that you would remain there for life never knew that a wish to go to a place was the same thing as a wish to stay but i did stay a matter of 10 years it didn't suit me to stay any longer and i'm not going again nick here mr raffles winked slowly as he looked at mr bolsterood do you wish to be settled in any business what is your calling now oh thank you my calling is to enjoy myself as much as i can i don't care about working anymore if i did anything it would be a little traveling in the tobacco line or something of that sort which takes a man into a agreeable company but not without an independence to fall back upon that's what i want i'm not so strong as i was nick though i've got more color than you i want an independence that could be supplied to you if you would engage to keep at a distance said mr bolsterood perhaps with a little too much eagerness in his undertone that must be as it suits my convenience said raffles cooly i see no reason why i shouldn't make a few acquaintances here about i'm not ashamed of myself as company for anybody i dropped my portmanteau at the turnpike when i got down change of linen genuine honor bright more than fronts and wristbands and with this suit of morning straps and everything i should do your credit among the knobs here mr raffles had pushed away his chair and looked down at himself particularly at his straps his chief intention was to annoy bolsterood but he really thought that his appearance now would produce a good effect and that he was not only handsome and witty but clad in a morning style which implied solid connections if you intend to rely on me in any way mr raffles had bolsterood after a moment's pause you will expect to meet my wishes i to be sure said raffles with a mocking cordiality didn't i always do it lord you made a pretty thing out of me and i got but little i've often thought since i might have done better by telling the old woman that i'd found her daughter and her grandchild it would have suited my feelings better i've got a soft place in my heart but you've buried the old lady by this time i suppose it's all one to her now and you've got your fortune out of that profitable business which had such a blessing on it you've taken to being a knob buying land being a country basho still in the dissenting line still godly or taken to the church as more genteel this time mr raffles slowing and slight protrusion of his time was worse than a nightmare because it held a certitude that it was not a nightmare but a waking misery mr bolsterood felt a shuddering nausea and did not speak but was considering diligently whether he should not leave raffles to do as he would and simply defy him as a slanderer the man would soon show himself disreputable enough to make people disbelieve him but not when he tells any ugly looking truth about you said discerning consciousness and again it seemed no wrong to keep raffles at a distance but mr bolsterood shanked from the direct falsehood of denying true statements it was one thing to look back on forgiven sins now to explain questionable conformity to lax customs and another to enter deliberately on the necessity of falsehood but since bolster did not speak raffles ran on by way of using time to the utmost i've not had such fine luck as you by joe things went confoundedly with me in new york those jankies are cool hands and a man of gentlemanly feelings has no chance with them i married when i came back a nice woman in the tobacco trade very fond of me but the trade was restricted as we say she had been settled there a good many years by a friend but there was a son too much in the case josh and i never hit it off however i made the most of the position and i've always taken my glass in good company it's been all on the square with me i must open as the day you won't take a deal of me that i didn't look you up before i've got a complaint that makes me a little deletory i thought you were trading and praying away in london still and didn't find you there but you see i was sent to you nick perhaps for a blessing to both of us mr raffles ended with a jokers snuffle no man felt his intellect more superior to religious count and if the cunning which calculates on the meanest feelings in men could be called intellect he had his share for under the blurting rallying tone with which he spoke to balstrid there was an evident selection of statements as if they had been so many moves at chess meanwhile balstrid had determined on his move and he said with gathered resolution you will do well to reflect mr raffles that it is possible for a man to overreach himself in the effort to secure undue advantage although i am not in any way bound to you i am willing to supply you with a regular annuity in quarterly payments so long as you fulfill the promise to remain at a distance from this neighborhood it is in your power to choose if you insist on remaining here even for a short time you will get nothing from me i shall decline to know you haha said raffles with an affected explosion that reminds me of a drawl dog of a thief who declined to know the constable your illusions are lost on me sir said balstrid with white heat the law has no hold on me either through your agency or any other you can't understand a joke my good fellow i only meant that i should never decline to know you but let us be serious your quarterly payment won't quite shoot me i like my freedom here raffles rose and stalked once or twice up and down the room swinging his leg and assuming an air of masterly meditation at last he stopped opposite balstrid and said i will tell you what give us a couple of hundreds come that's modest and i'll go away honor bright pick up my portmanteau and go away but i shall not give up my liberty for a dirty annuity i shall come and go where i like perhaps it may suit me to stay away and correspond with a friend perhaps not have you the money with you no i have 100 said balstrid feeling the immediate riddance to greater relief to be rejected on the ground of future uncertainties i will forward you the other if you will mention an address no i'll wait here till you bring it said raffles i'll take a stroll and have a snack and you will be back by that time mr balstrid's sickly body shattered by the agitations he had gone through since the last evening made him feel objectively in the power of this loud invulnerable man at that moment he snatched at a temporary repose to be won on any terms he was rising to do what raffles suggested when the latter said lifting up his finger as if with sudden recollection i did have another look after sarah again though i didn't tell you i'd attend her conscience about that pretty young woman i didn't find her but i found out her husband's name and i made a note of it but hang it i lost my pocket book however if i heard it i should note again i've got my faculties as if i was in my prime but names were out by joe sometimes i'm no better than a confounded tax paper before the names are filled in however if i hear of her and her family you shall know nick you'd like to do something for her now she's your stepdaughter doubtless said mr balstrid with the usual steady look of his slight gray eyes though that might reduce my power of assisting you as he walked out of the room raffles winked slowly at his back and then turned towards the window to watch the banker riding away virtually at his command his lips first curled with a smile and then opened with a short triumphant laugh but what the juice was the name he presently said half allowed scratching his head and wrinkling his brows horizontally he had not really cared or thought about this point of forgetfulness until it occurred to him in his invention of annoyances for balstrid it began with l it was almost all else i fancy he went on with the sense that he was getting hold of the slippery name but the hole was too slight and he soon got tired of his dismantled chase for few men were more impatient of private occupation or more in need of make themselves continually heard than mr raffles he preferred using his time in pleasant conversation with the bailiff and the housekeeper from whom he gathered as much as he wanted to know about mr balstruz position in middle march after all however there was a dull space of time which needed relieving with bread and cheese and ale and when he was seated alone with these resources in the wainscoted parlor he suddenly slapped his knee and exclaimed ladyslaw that action of memory which he had tried to set going and had abandoned in despair had suddenly completed itself without conscious effort a common experience agreeable as a completed sneeze even if the name remembered is of no value raffles immediately took out his pocketbook and wrote down the name not because he expected to use it but merely for the sake of not being at loss if he ever did happen to want it he was not going to tell balstrud there was no actual good in telling and to a mind like that of mr raffles there is always a probable good in a secret he was satisfied with his present success and by three o'clock that day he had taken up a sport mentor at the turnpike and mounted the coach relieving mr balstrud's eyes of an ugly black spot on the landscape at stone court but not relieving him of the dreed that the black spot might reappear and become inseparable even from the vision of his earth end of chapter 53 of george elliot's middle march read by los rolander